On Sticking One's Patriotic Neck Out to Clean up Government
Copyright (C) 5 January 2016
I have become familiar with "Patriot" arguments like this one I found while slogging through a patriot's manifesto:
"That many years later, after I found out that having and using a Social Security Number changed my status from a natural State Citizen with constitutionally guaranteed Rights and someone nonresident to Federal Government jurisdiction to that of a 14th Amendment resident with only regulated privileges granted by the Federal Government as protection from government oppression, I revoked, rescinded and canceled the number and have never used the number again."
Naturally, I wondered where he "found out" that information and why he deemed it factual. Regardless of his reasons, I disagree.
And I have another consideration to ponder. A wise man once told me this:
“If the rocket ship flies at mach 6, and you stick your neck out at a right angle to the direction of travel, your head's gonna break off."
The problem: People expect things to work a certain way, according to some ideal. When things stop working according to that ideal, they suspect skullduggery, conspiracy, crookedness, etc. They suspect it anywhere from thievery and enslavement at the bottom of the hierarchy, all the way to plotting and scheming to steal and enslave at the highest level, in or out of government.
Bad people find it easy to steal when posing as government, and easiest to steal and get away Scott free when bribing and intimidating government employees to make laws beneficial to them, developing a money system and getting their minions in government to make it into law, and stirring up big trouble and lending money to government to quell the trouble, thereby creating a national/state/county/city debt.
Debt with Interest has become the supreme instrument of enslaving a civilized populace. Such people need the apparency of full personal liberty so that they can choose a form of work that provides an income that enables them to pay the debt service. So the financial overlords don't want to see such people chained up.
People win against such efforts by becoming self-sufficient, refusing to become indebted, becoming affluent, and climbing to the top of the heap, a task requiring intelligence, ambition, and industry. The prosperous can more easily become part of the solution to bad government, and not just part of the problem. Intelligent, spiritually motivated people usually prosper, while cretins and those of lowly motive usually become impoverished and miserable.
Regarding government becoming abusive to the people, most folks realize that they must pay a price for government. That includes tolerating some abuse in order to enjoy security that allows them to go about their business in life. No government exhibits perfection. According to the Bible, even God had problems with his heavenly government rebels like Lucifer and Satan who created monumental troubles for angels and humans.
People have the natural right to create governments to provide the people with security and to organize and coordinate public infrastructures. And when governments thwart those purposes by serving other special interests, the people have the right to remove and punish the malefactors by any expedient means.
True Americans, colonists, acknowledged that reality in the Declaration of Independence of 1776:
http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/declaration_transcript.html:
"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.--Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world."[Litany of abuses follows]
Founders of Florida's state government acknowledged the same reality in the Florida Constitution of 1838.
http://archive.law.fsu.edu/crc/conhist/1838con.html
"We, the People of the Territory of Florida, by our Delegates in Convention, assembled at the City of St. Joseph, on Monday the 3d day of December, A.D. 1838, and of the Independence of the United States the sixty-third year, having and claiming the right of admission into the Union, as one of the United States of America, consistent with the principles of the Federal Constitution, and by virtue of the Treaty of Amity, Settlement, and Limits between the United States of America and the King of Spain, ceding the Provinces of East and West Florida to the United States; in order to secure to ourselves and our posterity the enjoyment of all the rights of life, liberty, and property, and the pursuit of happiness, do mutually agree, each with the other, to form ourselves into a Free and Independent State, by the name of the State of Florida.
"ARTICLE I. Declaration of Rights.
"That the great and essential principles of liberty and free government may be recognized and established, we declare:
"Section 1. That all freemen, when they form a social compact, are equal; and have certain inherent and indefeasible rights, among which are those of enjoying and defending life and liberty; of acquiring, possessing, and protecting property and reputation; and of pursuing their own happiness.
"Section 2. That all political power is inherent in the people, and all free governments are founded on their authority, and established for their benefit; and, therefore, they have, at all times, an inalienable and indefeasible right to alter or abolish their form of government, in such manner as they may deem expedient. "
I personally believe each American must answer to his own conscience in the “expedient manner” mentioned in the 1838 Florida Constitution. A “form of government” can consist of a single malefactor or a cadre of them operating under the guise of honest government, or as a band of Mafia thugs. “We the People” have the right (both inalienable (none may remove it) and indefeasible (none may yield it)) to alter or abolish government that ceases to operate for our ("We the People's") benefit. Indisputably. Period.
And, since all government employees know this intuitively (do they really need the American Revolutionary War, and the Declaration of Independence, and the Florida Constitution to remind them?), this axiom logically follows (you may quote me on this):
“Government employees who betray the public trust and violate the Constitution’s guarantee of rights of the people or limits on government power thereby BEG for their own assassination.”
Of course, Americans should realize that the general imperfection of people explains imperfections in government. But imperfections differ greatly from intentional abuse of rights or imposing gargantuan tax burdens on the populace without proper cause, or by warping the Constitution to make it inscrutable.
Each "true American" has the obligation to seek out others of like mind in this regard. Such Americans (I’d call them "Patriots" but I don’t want left-leaning elitists to defame them with such a noble appellation) must educate themselves and one another in principles and ideals of good government. They must join one another in creating an indomitable political force. That force must effectively correct the political machinery that allows government to defeat the principles and ideals of good government, and to discipline or remove those in opposition.
Unfortunately, THAT requires a monumental amount of time, energy, money, and life resources. And many, lacking in intelligence, education, patience, and personal resources, do not have what it takes to achieve the ambition of “We the People” to keep government honest and constitutional.
Sometimes, the true American patriot must simply pick up an instrument of long-distance lethality and summarily excise a key malefactor from government. The true American patriot must do this alone or with a small number of hard-core confederates in order to prevent detection and survive the experience. Sometimes an American must risk or forfeit fame, fortune, and life itself to accomplish such a noble deed. Considering the damage a determined malefactor can do to the nation and its people, a true American pays a small, if ultimate, price by giving his life in such an endeavor.
Assassins intending to “fix” government risked their lives on the final day of Julius Caesar, John F. Kennedy, and Vince Foster. An untold number of Bankers have met their ends through putative suicides in the past couple of years, possibly the work of determined true Americans. And early Americans, as a consequence of signing the Declaration of Independence, lost their fame, fortunes, and lives to King George’s agents.
Such examples prove the value of stealth and anonymity when protecting rights in a crowd hostile to them. In order to succeed and continue succeeding at preserving rights, one must avoid detection to the extent possible, and have innumerable confederates otherwise.
I do not mean to suggest one who feels angry with government ought to grab a gun and shoot the place up. Most folks inclined to such action do have a family to care for. But every American has similar excuses for not tampering with government crookedness. And every American suffers from myopia to an extent – the people simply do not know what transpires, why it transpired, the precise culprits, or available alternative actions. And many Americans THINK they know what the Constitution says and means, but they actually do not know.
Many litigants, for example, accuse the courts of crookedness when in reality, the litigants have no clue how courts operate, or what judges do or should do. And many have not studied the rules of procedure or evidence or read a litigation practice manual. So they simply do not have the qualifications to determine whether or to what extent the courts have become crooked, or they themselves suffer from incompetence and ignorance.
So, one ought to think carefully and competently before one acts to defeat crookedness in government. One ought to consult a variety of formal and informal experts before concluding that everybody but oneself has become a crook.
Readers, by the time you have done all the preparation, research, and study necessary to satisfy yourself, your life will probably have neared its end.